Of these there hath been due warning and advice by divers declarations and protestations &''^ hoping that they may thereby reflect and desist, if not reduced, from said practices. But so it is, all moral means thereunto have been without effect still persisting and increasing their numbers both by a crowd of papists and french whose greatest hope is considered to be from these friends, being approved apostates from the Protestant Church and equal destroyers of it, not hesitating to declare their Bloody Resolutions of which they have been convicted & the perpetration of which would endanger the whole Province

Wherefore being unwilling to deliver Ourselves and descendants with our Properties to be reduced to such a miserable state & Condition as the a\)ove related particulars certainly threaten, We have Resolved & do Resolve to resist the same to the utmost of our power, at the hazard of our lives & properties; united with & assisted by our said Lieut. Governor and each other, for the maintenance of that Law & Liberty which God & our Gracious Sovereign have granted us, abhorring & detesting all such as Brand us with the opprobrious and undeserved character of Rebels, whereby they would withdraw us from our duty to God, the King and Ourselves to become a prey to their Implacable malice & Violence ; with firm confidence that having made so plain and clear an offer, namely That every thing should remain in the former inoffensive condition until his Excellency Coll Sloughter's arrival or until the appearance of his Majesty's